Unexpected Si:Al effect on the binary mixtures liquid phase adsorption selectivities in faujasite zeolites

A batch technique was applied to determine the equilibrium adsorption of benzene from its benzene/octane and benzene/octene mixture on NaX (Si:Al 1.20) and NaY (Si:Al 2.79) in liquid phase. Benzene was preferentially adsorbed from both mixtures on NaX and NaY. Regardless whether octane or octene was present in the binary mixture, benzene was adsorbed more selectively on the high-silica NaY compared to NaX, which contained more cations. The presence of cations on the SIII/SIII' site inside the supercages of NaX causes a more difficult hosting of benzene inside the supercages of NaX and especially on the 12-membered ring site. However, at sufficiently high external benzene concentration (>10 mol %), the 12-membered ring site of NaX will be occupied by benzene, leading to a maximum adsorption capacity of five benzenes per supercage on both NaX and NaY. The double bond present inside octene allows the molecules to compete for the adsorption sites with benzene. The competitive effect of octene prevents the fifth benzene molecule to adsorb in the NaX supercage within the investigated concentration range.     

Mechanistic study of an improbable reaction: alkene dehydrogenation by the delta12 acetylenase of Crepis alpina

The mechanism by which the fatty acid acetylenase of Crepis alpina catalyzes crepenynic acid ((9Z)-octadeca-9-en-12-ynoic acid) production from linoleic acid has been probed through the use of kinetic isotope effect (KIE) measurements. This was accomplished by incubating appropriate mixtures of regiospecifically deuterated isotopomers with a strain of Saccharomyces cerevisiae expressing a functional acetylenase. LC/MS analysis of crepenynic acid obtained in these experiments showed that the oxidation of linoleate occurs in two discrete steps, since the cleavage of the C12-H bond is very sensitive to isotopic substitution (k(H)/k(D) = 14.6 +/- 3.0) while a minimal isotope effect (k(H)/k(D) = 1.25 +/- 0.08) was observed for the C13-H bond breaking step. These data suggest that crepenynic acid is produced via initial H-atom abstraction at C12 of a linoleoyl substrate. The relationship between the mechanism of enzymatic acetylenation and epoxidation is discussed.     

A kinetic study of metallocene‐catalyzed ethylene polymerization using different aluminoxane cocatalysts

The kinetics of ethylene polymerization using homogeneous Cp₂ZrCl₂/aluminoxane catalysts in toluene has been investigated at 70 °C with an ethylene pressure of 30 psi. Four aluminoxanes were used: methylaluminoxane, modified methylaluminoxanes with a fraction of methyl groups substituted with isobutyl (MMAO‐4) or octyl (MMAO‐12) groups, and polymethylaluminoxane (PMAO‐IP). The cocatalyst‐to‐catalyst ratio, [Al]/[Zr], varied from 1000 to 10,000. The experimental results obtained using the four cocatalysts were compared and a model was proposed to fit the rate of polymerization as a function of polymerization time and [Al]/[Zr] ratio. Molecular weight distributions with polydispersities between three and four indicate the presence of more than one active site type. We proposed a model that explained these broad molecular weight distributions using an unstable active complex that is formed in the early stages of the reaction and is transformed over time to a more stable active complex via an intermediate. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 45: 1677–1690, 2007     

Hot electron production using the Texas Petawatt Laser irradiating thick gold targets

We present data for relativistic hot electron production by the Texas Petawatt Laser irradiating solid Au targets with thickness between 1 and 4 mm. The experiment was performed at the short focus target chamber TC1 in July 2011, with intensities on the order of several ×10¹⁹ W/cm² and laser energies around 50 J. We discuss the design of an electron-positron magnetic spectrometer to record the lepton energy spectra ejected from the Au targets and present a deconvolution algorithm to extract the lepton energy spectra. We measured hot electron spectra out to ～50 MeV, which show a narrow peak around 10–20 MeV, plus high energy exponential tail. The hot electron spectral shapes appear significantly different from those reported for other PW lasers.     

New Insights in Frustrated Lewis Pair Chemistry with Azides

The geminal frustrated Lewis pair (FLP) tBu₂PCH₂BPh₂ ( 1 ) reacts with phenyl-, mesityl-, and tert-butyl azide affording, respectively, six, five, and four-membered rings as isolable products. DFT calculations revealed that the formation of all products proceeds via the six-membered ring structure, which is thermally stable with an N-phenyl group, but rearranges when sterically more encumbered Mes−N₃ and tBu−N₃ are used. The reaction of 1 with Me₃Si−N₃ is believed to follow the same course, yet subsequent N₂ elimination occurs to afford a four-membered heterocycle ( 5 ), which can be considered as a formal FLP-trimethylsilylnitrene adduct. Compound 5 reacts with hydrochloric acid or tetramethylammonium fluoride and showed frustrated Lewis pair reactivity towards phenylisocyanate.     

Bis(phosphine imide)s: easily tunable organic electron donors

[graph: see text] The electrochemical, structural, and spectroscopic properties of bis(phosphine imide)s have been investigated. p-Phenylenebis(phosphine imide)s Ar3PNC6H4NPAr3 (1a-d) have two reversible single-electron oxidations. The first oxidation potentials can be varied from -0.05 to 0.15 V (versus SCE) by modification of the substituents on phosphorus (Ar). Electron-donating substituents lower the oxidation potential, while electron-withdrawing substituents increase the oxidation potential. The difference between the first and second oxidation potential (deltaE, 0.41-0.50) and the electronic coupling (Hab, 1.1 eV) are similar for 1a-d. Computational (DFT) and UV-visible-NIR spectroscopic investigations of 1a-d suggest that the first oxidation leads to a delocalized radical cation 1a*+ while the second oxidation leads to a quinonoidal dicationic state 1a2+. The aromatic linker between phosphine imides has also been modified. Upon oxidation, N,N'-4,4'-biphenylene(bis(triphenyl)phosphine imide) (3) forms radical cationic and a dicationic species similar to 1a-d. While deltaE (0.18 V) and Hab (0.63 eV) are smaller, suggesting weaker electronic communication between the two P=N units in the radical cationic state, the presence of NIR absorptions with vibrational fine structure (768, 861, and 983 nm) supports the formation of delocalized radical cation for 3*+.     

Adiabatic quantum search scheme with atoms in a cavity driven by lasers

We propose an implementation of the quantum search algorithm of a marked item in an unsorted list of N items by adiabatic passage in a cavity-laser-atom system. We use an ensemble of N identical three-level atoms trapped in a single-mode cavity and driven by two lasers. In each atom, the same level represents a database entry. One of the atoms is marked by having an energy gap between its two ground states. Appropriate time delays between the two laser pulses allow one to populate the marked state starting from an initial entangled state within a decoherence-free adiabatic subspace. The time to achieve such a process is shown to exhibit the square root N Grover speedup.     

Coordination complexes of the dimethyl-thio-phosphonium cation and ligand exchange

The quantitative exchange of a 4-(dimethylamino)pyridine ligand on the dimethyl-thio-phosphonium cation by Me3P demonstrates the coordinative nature of the N-P and P-P bond and diversifies a fundamentally important new direction in the coordination chemistry of phosphorus as an acceptor.     

Optical microwell array for large scale studies of single mitochondria metabolic responses

Microsystems based on microwell arrays have been widely used for studies on single living cells. In this work, we focused on the subcellular level in order to monitor biological responses directly on individual organelles. Consequently, we developed microwell arrays for the entrapment and fluorescence microscopy of single isolated organelles, mitochondria herein. Highly dense arrays of 3-μm mean diameter wells were obtained by wet chemical etching of optical fiber bundles. Favorable conditions for the stable entrapment of individual mitochondria within a majority of microwells were found. Owing to NADH auto-fluorescence, the metabolic status of each mitochondrion was analyzed at resting state (Stage 1), then following the addition of a respiratory substrate (Stage 2), ethanol herein, and of a respiratory inhibitor (Stage 3), antimycin A. Mean levels of mitochondrial NADH were increased by 29 % and 35 % under Stages 2 and 3, respectively. We showed that mitochondrial ability to generate higher levels of NADH (i.e., its metabolic performance) is not correlated either to the initial energetic state or to the respective size of each mitochondrion. This study demonstrates that microwell arrays allow metabolic studies on populations of isolated mitochondria with a single organelle resolution.